Floods damage 1,200 school buildings in Jammu

Jammu: The floods in Jammu & Kashmir have dealt a severe blow to the educational infrastructure with 1,276 government schools damaged across Jammu. The administration has now embarked on an urgent ‘repair and relocation’ plan so that students can attend classes again.

"We have submitted a proposal of Rs 62 crore for repair and reconstruction of damaged educational infrastructure to the government so that school education setup is brought back on its feet," Director of school education, Jammu, H R Pakhroo said.

"The recent floods in the state have severely affected the routine class work in 1,276 government schools across Jammu province. The buildings of these institutions have been either partially or fully damaged," he added.

Of these, 200 buildings have either been washed away or fully damaged and over 1000 are partially damaged, he said.

"We have asked the planning department to release the amount so that work of restoration of the educational setup in schools is put on fast track," Pakhroo said.

Apart from this, a plan has been chalked out for shifting the schools to panchayat ghars and other such accommodations so that students can resume classes at the earliest, he added.

The schools in low-lying areas in 70 villages in Jammu, which were inundated, are still filled with mud and slush making it difficult for the school authorities to run classes.

Three districts including border districts of Jammu, Rajouri and Poonch have suffered extensive damage to school buildings.

"We have to make urgent and alternative arrangements for the students under the this plan," he said adding classes are being run in some makeshift schools.

The Department has also resorted to "clubbing of schools" in a neighbourhood, he said.

Giving details about the damaged school infrastructure, the Director said Reasi district tops the table with 288 buildings being affected, followed by Poonch with 198 buildings and Udhampur with 172 buildings.

163 buildings in Rajouri and 121 in Jammu district schools have been damaged along with 110 in Ramban, 70 in Doda, 53 in Kishtwar and 34 in Samba district and rest in Kathua.

In Kashmir Valley, there has been partial restoration of schools. However, in Srinagar city, the educational infrastructure is still paralyzed due to the deluge.